In the comments of the earlier post Compared to What? there was some discussion of why some people support Bush, even some that didn't vote for him in 2000 or vote for Republicans in general. In a new post Timothy Burke, a key participant in that earlier discussion, has more to say.

I still don’t understand fully the other part of the solidly pro-Bush constituency that I encounter online and in everyday life. It’s not so much irrational as arational in my reading. I don’t understand where it’s coming from in social terms--it seems rather heterogeneous and distributed--or whether it is in fact a structurally immobile, deeply fixed political posture whose terms draw from something prior to and unaffected by conjunctural political thought or experience. It doesn't seem economically or politically self-interested to me in the way that Thomas Frank argues it is (I have been thinking a lot about Frank lately, but Michael Berube has said most of what I might say, and far better than I could). Maybe most of Kerry's voters are the same way: using their vote as a communicative act, expressing deep-rooted social identities in antagonism to others, rather than as a reasoned, affirmative choice.

I don’t really know if there’s much of anybody making what I would call a choice this November, voting one way while conceivably holding out the possibility of voting another under some other circumstance. I hear from the non-religious Bush voters that they don’t like or trust John Kerry, but it’s not clear to me that they would like or trust anyone but Bush in 2004, perhaps not even Republicans at the fringes of the party consensus like John McCain or Colin Powell. I begin to think that their feelings about Kerry come from someplace that precedes conscious thought, from the sources and wellsprings of their own social identity and self-perception.

A recent essay by Arnold Kling, Sympathy for the Undecided, comes to mind:

First of all, I am humble about expressing my political preferences. After all, I made a big mistake last time.

In 2000, I voted for Al Gore. I knew that his positions on economics issues, such as Social Security, education vouchers, and class warfare, were incompatible with mine. But nonetheless I thought that he would bring in a better economic team than George Bush. My problem with George Bush was on issues such as the death penalty and gay marriage, where I did not even agree with him, much less share his moral certitude.

Shortly after the election, I regretted my choice. I believed at the time, and I believe even more strongly now, that Al Gore's decision to contest the election results was irresponsible and divisive.

In a close election, what Thomas Sowell might call "the search for cosmic justice" is futile. The right thing to do was to concede the election and move on. Gore's legal challenge was the most damaging act in the American body politic since the McCarthy era...

the Democratic left wing has gone berserk over the 2000 election. They treat the Bush Administration as illegitimate. They wallow in paranoia and conspiracy theories.

Had I known that Al Gore was going to launch such a post-election intifada, I would never have voted for him. Given how badly I feel about that episode, I cannot state that I have much confidence that I won't regret my choice this year.

I seem to travel in different circles than Timothy because mostly what I see are rational people making choices and doing an increasingly lucid job of explaining them. It is dead common to find people who tend to prefer Democrats on social issues and Republicans, or at least their rhetoric, on economic issues. I also find the opposite, old style Democrats who prefer Democrat economics but not their social drift of the past few years. What I see, contra Timothy, is great fluidity as both parties try to redefine themselves, an ongoing activity that results in great change over time, a task made more confusing by terrorism and the events of 9/11.

In other words, what I see is large numbers of people who don't identify with either party but make an informed decision when voting, one that can go either way depending on the issues and candidates. They even resort to tie breakers by considering other members of the team, the depth of "the bench", and likely trends or events that will influence how closely candidates will stick to their stated intentions, knowing full well that promises will only be kept if convenient and politically profitable.

I'm not questioning the existence of of the arational voters Timothy sees, I just don't see them as being too important or indicative of social trends. I don't see anything novel about groups on either side "expressing deep-rooted social identities in antagonism to others, rather than as a reasoned, affirmative choice". Solidarity isn't new.

I think of voting as a hiring function; I'm hiring a team of politicians to manage an enterprise, a decision that isn't purely economic since I have social views too, and those I care about are affected. I know that the candidates for the position are trying to present themselves in the best light possible, that they are less than they claim as well as more than they know. If I hire the wrong team it is my fault as well as theirs since I do, I must, consider myself to be a responsible decision maker with insights about the candidates that they do not themselves possess.

In 2000 the choice between Bush and Gore was easy for me though not satisfying. I didn't like either candidate but of the two Gore was far, far worse. His actions over the previous decade were those of a man who didn't know himself, hadn't examined his life, and would crumble under pressure. He demonstrated that repeatedly during the campaign, showing consistency with his past, and exploded into gibbering gobbets when he squandered a large early lead and lost a close race. Since then he has literally seemed to have lost touch with reality. Kling's view that Gore was was irresponsible and divisive, launching a post-election intifada, was entirely predictable from his past behavior. He's another intellectual "homicide bomber" unable to see past his personal issues.

Bush and his team have done far better than I expected, which says more about my low expectations than their actions. I didn't agree with their decisions to go to war in either Afghanistan or Iraq, but it was clear that they had huge popular support and no credible alternatives were offered, even from me. Had we waited as I wanted, not gone to war, things may have gotten worse for failing to act decisively and they surely would have remained at least as bad as they already were. There was no international will to oppose the terrorists, a key requirement for all approaches short of war. Too many nations, especially in Europe, are essentially in the arms business as suppliers and enablers of terrorists. It has always been so and probably always will be so.

The charge of arationality, people apparently voting against their own interests, perhaps only affirming identity and rooted antagonism, isn't as useful an explanation as that revealed by recent studies suggesting that people act against what an outside observer thinks is their interests but do so for interesting reasons: they distrust authorities. When their doubts about the reliability of available information are factored in the apparent arationality and even irrationality dissolves.

It's no profound insight to note that we live in a culture of deceit in an even more deceitful world. Everyone is spinning everything. This is a huge intellectual energy sink and so widely resented, but perhaps more importantly it can affect choices. A candidate like Kerry that is intentionally vague, apparently indecisive, reputedly fickle and obviously deceitful when speaking seems a greater risk than a plainer spoken candidate like Bush. It isn't that Bush is judged to be honest, he's a politician, it's that he's easier to read, takes less energy to comprehend. With Bush it is possible to reach a provisional conclusion about his tendencies and probable behavior but with Kerry the exercise is impossible. Bush benefits from this when people simply give up and choose the candidate with knowable negatives rather than the one with unmeasurable negatives assumed to be huge and seemingly riskier for lack of bounds. He could do anything, even Gore-like melt down when faced with the inevitable need to make decisions.

What I find curious and instructive is the large number of people that fail to comprehend the Gore tragedy, or that minimize, excuse or even applaud his behavior, and so align themselves, broadly speaking, with the remnants of his constituency and their intellectual descendants. I've been reading TSOW and find interesting parallels in that old conflict. Modern Democrats seem much like those old Jacobite Tories while modern Republicans seem much like those old semi-republican Whigs. The Berube post, channeling Frank, that Timothy linked is revealing.

... when Frank insists that for the New Right, “cultural anger is marshaled to achieve economic ends. And it is these economic achievements – not the forgettable skirmishes of the never-ending culture wars – that are the movement’s greatest monuments” (6). But his own work shows that for many heartland conservatives, it really is about the cultural anger; it’s a cultural anger that is marshaled to cultural ends, and they don’t mind being impoverished by the economic agenda of Bush’s crony klepto-capitalism. On the contrary, for them, their immiseration is but another sign of their Election: they understand that they must live in poverty and tribulation on this earth, because they are serving a higher calling, namely, protecting unborn babies in the womb and/or protecting the sanctity of holy matrimony. Let those weaselly Europeans have health care – we guide ourselves, instead, by what Jesus would do. And Jesus would surely bomb an abortion clinic.

No, they don't "understand that they must live in poverty and tribulation on this earth", they see the economic and cultural aspects of life in a consistent and coherent world view and expect increased material well being in a more humane world once the Jacobite Tories are defeated. What they accept is a period of deprivation during battle but the long term benefit to themselves and their children is worth the current pain and required in any case by their beliefs. They see no end to deprivation under Jabobite rule since their system is designed to maintain the old arrangements and they openly disparage material well being with a cultural sneer much like that of today's cultural elites who live in luxury while belittling those who aspire to such comforts.

The cultural issues of abortion and affirmative action are analogous to the Whig issues of slavery and royalty. Abortion is the new slavery, a barbaric practice that degrades humans, and affirmative action is the new royalty, special benefits based on genetics and power. The details are wildly different, but the core content of the conflict seems analogous. It also resonates with the old alliances - parts of the Protestant world, especially in America, versus the nominally Catholic world, especially in France, with the UK a battle ground between the two, threatened at its back by the Irish allegiance to Catholic France and at its front by the mostly Catholic continent of Europe. Even the old anti-semitism of Catholic Europe, and disdain for commerce, banking and other Jewish behaviors, is still virulent.

I expect this conflict to endure though the details will change. As slavery was abolished, made obsolete by machinery, so will abortion be eliminated by superior technology. As monarchy was abolished (mostly except for ceremonial and ideological comfort), made obsolete by superior methods of governance, a technique enabled by technology, so will affirmative action be eliminated by superior educational and economic technology. Abortion is already in decline as is affirmative action. The question is what will be the new flash points, the new slavery and new genetic preference system? Slavery was an aspect of genetic preference though with a cultural component. It may be that the current conflicts with Islam, where the Jacobites deny that Islamic cultures are even capable of democracy and other Whiggish behaviors, will continue for a few decades and become the new entrenched front.

This is all a bit fanciful, a dashed off essay insufficiently researched and analyzed, but it seems so much more rich and insightful than the pale efforts of both Franks and Berube that it seems worth further thought if only to correct my errors. The apparent inversion of roles that sees Democrats as conservative guardians of ancient privelege and Republicans as progressive advocates of modern humanistic values when viewed from that long range perspective will seem incomprehensible to many.

Much political analysis seems to view the world as having begun in 1917 and explains all conflict as an aspect of the industrial age tropes of workers versus capitalists. It may be more useful to go further back and contextualize that conflict too, seeing it is an aspect of far older divisions and largely a result of failure to resolve them. It's not even a religious conflict at core though religious groups align themselves on one side or the other and skirmish on those issues. The conflict will continue. The confusions do result in groups aligning themselves on the wrong side of their own core beliefs and interests. Many Democrats seem to belong on the Whig side though they fight under Jacobite banners, and many Republicans seem to belong on the Jacobite side though they fight under Whig banners. I suspect this is explainable as inertia, a lag between the time that it is apparent that they are misaligned and the the time they switch. I expect continued defections in both directions.

As a progressive and a technophile I have no allegiance to either side in the conflict since neither champions my views. I'm comfortable tacking from one side to the other while trying to sail close to the wind. Berube parrots the dire predictions of social disaster favored by the Bushaters:

...how many of you are willing to bet that nothing important will change in these forgettable, never-ending culture wars if Bush is elected in November and appoints two or three new justices to the Supreme Court?

How many are willing to bet the obverse? Fear of change and the comfortable expression of hatred seem the defining characteristics of these modern day Jacobites whatever their more rational positions on issues. Though they have my sympathy on many of those issues they don't have either the intellectual or political leadership to handle real power or advance society in the direction I favor. They look and sound weak, confused and emotionally broken. There is much work to do in the next four years.